by Eric Flint
A woman's voice was screaming inside the wagon. Valentinian stooped and entered, both his weapons ready for combat. Ajatasutra delayed a moment, leaning his head over the side to assess the progress of the battle between the Kushans and the Ye-tai. Then, grunting soft satisfaction, he followed Valentinian within.
"The Kushans should have it wrapped up soon," he said cheerfully. "I think we only lost four of them, too. Better than I expected."
Then, seeing Valentinian's rigid stance, Ajatasutra tensed. He couldn't really see most of the wagon's interior, because the cataphract was in the way. All Ajatasutra could spot was a young servant huddled in one far corner, shrieking with terror. The moment his eyes met hers, the servant's screaming stopped abruptly. Clearly enough, her terror had now gone beyond shrieks.
Crouched in the other corner, wearing very fine clothing, was a little girl. Sanga's daughter, he supposed. The girl's face was pale, and she was wide-eyed as only a six-year-old girl can be. But she seemed otherwise composed. At least she hadn't been screaming like the servant.
But what was in front of Valentinian? Ajatasutra had never seen the deadly cataphract so utterly prepared for mortal combat. As taut and alert as a mongoose facing a cobra. Apparently-Ajatasutra had not foreseen this possibility-Lady Sanga had brought one of her husband's most capable Rajput warriors along as a personal bodyguard.
"You draw him off to one side," Ajatasutra hissed, speaking in Greek. "I'll take him from the other."
Valentinian began to mutter something. Then, as he obeyed Ajatasutra's instructions, the mutter became something more in the way of a laughing exclamation.
"Good! You figure out how to handle this, you genius!"
With Valentinian out of the way, Ajatasutra could finally see the whole interior of the wagon. Lady Sanga, a plump, plain-faced and gray-haired woman, was sitting on the large settee at the front of the wagon. On her lap, clutched tightly, she was holding a four-year-old boy.
In front of her, standing between his mother and Valentinian, was the last of Sanga's children. A twelve-year-old boy, this one was. Ajatasutra knew that his name was Rajiv, and that the gap in age between himself and his two siblings was due to the death in infancy of two other children.
What he hadn't known.
— although he should have assumed it-
"Great," muttered Valentinian. "Just great. 'You draw him off and I'll take him from the other side.'"
Suddenly, the cataphract straightened and, with an abrupt-almost angry-gesture, slammed his spatha back in its scabbard. A moment later, the knife vanished somewhere in his armor.
Now empty-handed, Valentinian crossed his arms over his chest and leaned casually against the wagon's wall. Then he spoke, in clear and precise Hindi.
"I fought the kid's father once already, Ajatasutra. And once is enough to last me a lifetime. So you can kill the kid, if you want to. You can spend the rest of your life worrying that Sanga will come looking for you. I am not an idiot."
Ajatasutra stared at the boy. Rajiv held a sword in his hand and was poised in battle stance. Quite adeptly, in fact, given his age.
Of course, the boy's assurance was not all that surprising, now that Ajatasutra thought about it. He was the son of Rana Sanga, after all.
Ajatasutra was still trying to figure out how to disarm the boy without hurting him, when Rajiv himself solved his quandary. As soon as Valentinian finished speaking, the boy curled his lip. Quite an adult sneer it was, too.
"Had you truly fought my father, bandit, you would not be alive today." The twelve-year-old spit on the floor of the wagon. Quite a hefty glob of spittle it was, too. Ajatasutra was impressed.
"Only two men have ever faced my father in battle and lived to speak of it afterward. The first was the great Raghunath Rao, Panther of Majarashtra. The other was-"
He broke off, his eyes widening. Then, for the first time since Ajatasutra got sight of him, the boy's eyes lost that slightly vague focus of the trained swordsman who is watching everything at once, and fled to Valentinian's face.
His eyes widened further. Behind him, his mother uttered a sharp little cry. Ajatasutra couldn't tell if the wordless sound signified fear or hope. Possibly both.
"You are the Mongoose?" Rajiv's question was barely more than a whisper.
Valentinian grinned his narrow-faced weasel grin. Which was a bit unfortunate, thought Ajatasutra. That was not a very reassuring expression.
But then, moving quickly but easily, Valentinian removed the helmet from his head and dropped to one knee in front of the boy. Seeming completely oblivious to the naked blade not more than inches from his neck, he reached up a hand and parted the coarse black hair on his head.
"You can still see the scar," he said quietly. "Feel it, too, if you want to."
Rajiv lowered the sword, a bit. Then, slowly and hesitantly, reached out his other hand and ran fingers over Valentinian's scalp.
"It's a big scar," he said wonderingly. And now, in a tone of voice more appropriate to his age.
His mother finally spoke, after clearing her throat. "My husband always said the Mongoose was an honorable man. And certainly not a bandit or cutthroat."
Ajatasutra sighed with relief and sheathed his own dagger. "Nor is he, Lady Sanga. Nor am I or the men who came with us. I apologize for killing and injuring your Rajput companions. But we had no choice."
Mention of those men brought home to Ajatasutra that all noise coming from without the wagon had ceased. Clearly enough, the battle was over.
Proof came immediately. Making very little noise, Kujulo landed on the balcony and stuck his head into the interior.
"The Ye-tai are all dead. We're driving off those gutless cart-drivers now. Killed three so far. We thought to leave two, maybe three alive."
Ajatasutra nodded. "Just so long as they're driven far away. Near enough to see the caravan burn, but too far to see any details."
"What about the one guard? He'll never use that shoulder again-not for much, anyway-but he'll live if we take care of the wound. So will the old man."
Ajatasutra hesitated. There had been no room in his plans for bringing badly injured men with them. But, seeing the new stiffening in Rajiv's stance, he decided the alternative was worse. Clearly enough, Sanga's son-probably the mother, too-would put up a struggle to save their close retainers.
"Bind them up," he ordered curtly. "We can probably disguise them as diseased men. Or simply the victims of a bandit attack. Who knows? That might even help keep prying eyes away."
That done, he turned back to Lady Sanga. "We did not come to kill you, but to save you from harm. It is all very complicated. I do not have time now to explain it to you. You will just have to trust us, for the time being. We must move immediately or-"
"Malwa," hissed Lady Sanga. "Men and their stupid oaths! I told my husband they would play him for a fool." Seeing her son stiffening in front of her, she reached out a hand and swatted his head. Half-playfully, half. not.
"Stupid!" she repeated. "Even you, at twelve! Malwa will ruin us all."
When her eyes came back to Ajatasutra's, the assassin was almost stunned by the warmth and humor gleaming in them. For the first time, he began to understand why the great Rana Sanga had such a reputation for fidelity, despite the lack of comeliness of his wife.
* * *
An hour later, as they rode away from the scene of an apparent massacre, a pillar of smoke rising behind them, Valentinian claimed to have almost fallen in love with her.
"Would have, actually, except not even that woman is worth fighting Sanga again."
"You'd do anything to get out of doing a stint of honest work," jibed Anastasius.
Valentinian sneered. "Pah! The way she arranged the bodies from the cemetery? Perfect! Didn't even flinch once. Didn't even grimace."
The cataphract turned in his saddle and bestowed a look of mighty approval on the woman who was following them not far behind on a mule, wearing the clothing of a bandit's woman and c
lutching a rag-wrapped bandit's child before her. Two other bandit children-wrapped in even filthier rags-rode tandem on a mule alongside hers.
"I'll bet you my retirement bonus against yours that woman can cook anything. She probably laughs while she's chopping onions."
* * *
By evening, Valentinian was feeling positively cheerful. As it turned out, Lady Sanga apparently could cook almost anything.
"I was getting so sick of that damned Kushan food," he mumbled, around a mouthful of some savory item which Lady Sanga had prepared. Out of what, exactly, no one knew. The one item Lady Sanga had insisted on salvaging from her wagon, before the thing was put to the torch with the corpses from the cemetery in it, was a small chest full of her cooking supplies.
"No one will notice its absence," she'd claimed. Ajatasutra, despite some misgivings, had not pressed the point. He'd simply insisted that she transfer the supplies-which consisted mostly of onions, packets of herbs and spices and other savories, and a small knife-into various sacks, leaving the empty chest behind to burn in the flames. He agreed with her that no one would notice the absent supplies. But the chest, though not an expensive item likely to be stolen, had solid fittings which would survive the flames. Someone-someone like Nanda Lal and his best spies, at any rate-might notice the absence of those fittings, and start to wonder.
"Got onions in't," Valentinian continued happily. "I love onions."
Anastasius sighed heavily. "I don't miss their cooking, but I do miss the Kushans. I felt better with Kujulo and his maniacs around."
Ajatasutra began to say something, but Anastasius waved him down. "Don't bother! I understand the logic, you damned schemer. Five men-two of them injured, and one of them elderly-a woman, and three children can make their way across the Ganges plain without being noticed much. No way a large party of armed men could. Especially not Kushans. Not when we got to Kausambi, for sure."
Valentinian had finished devouring the savory by then, and Anastasius' last words brought back his normal gloom.
"I still say this plan is insane. We could get Lady Sanga and the children out now." He pointed to the southwest. "Easy enough-well, after a hard trek through the Thar-to reach the general's forces. Then-"
Ajatasutra began to speak again, but, again, Anastasius waved him down. "I'll deal with the little weasel." Glowering: "Valentinian, that'd be even more insane. This whole little rescue operation was a side trip added on at the last moment. We still have the main thing to accomplish. If we brought out Lady Sanga now that would expose the whole scheme-no way it wouldn't come out, in the middle of a whole army-and make the rest of it impossible. The only way to keep the secret is to hide it in the belly of the beast. In Kausambi, the last place Nanda Lal would think to look."
"Narses!" hissed Valentinian. "Too clever by half!" But he left off arguing the point.
The supremacy of logic having been restored, Anastasius went back to his own worries. "I just miss having the Kushans around. I don't begrudge it to them, mind you, getting back to their own folk. And since they'll pass through the Sind on their way, they can probably give the general word of how we're doing. But-" He sighed, even more heavily than before. "It's going to be tricky, with just the three of us, if we get attacked by real bandits."
Lady Sanga and the children had eaten earlier, and she had given the two wounded Rajputs what care she could. So now she and her children were sitting around the campfire listening to the exchange. No sooner had Anastasius finished than Rajiv sprang to his feet, drawing his sword and waving it about.
"Bandits-pah! Against the Mongoose? And there are four of us!"
The twelve-year-old boy's enthusiasm did not seem to mollify Anastasius. Ajatasutra shared the giant cataphract's skepticism. Having an overconfident and rambunctious lad as an "additional warrior" struck him as more trouble than help.
And, judging from the fierce scowl on his face, Valentinian felt even more strongly about it. But Valentinian's displeasure, it became immediately apparent, had a more immediate focus.
"You hold a sword that way in a fight, boy, you're a dead man."
Rajiv lowered the blade, his face a study in contradiction. One the one hand, chagrin. On the other, injured-even outraged-pride.
"My father taught me to hold a sword!" he protested. "Rana Sanga himself!"
Valentinian shook his head, rose with his usual quick and fluid speed, and drew his own sword. "He didn't teach you that grip," he growled. "If he had, I wouldn't have this scar on my head and he'd be buried on a mountainside in Persia."
The cataphract stalked off a few paces onto an empty patch of ground. The sun had set over the horizon, but there was still enough light to see. He turned, and made a come-hither gesture with his sword.
"May as well start tonight, boy. If you're going to be any help against bandits, your swordwork has got to get better."
Eagerly, Rajiv trotted forward to begin his new course of instruction. Behind him, Lady Sanga shook her head, not so much ruefully as with a certain sense of detached irony.
"There's something peculiar about all this," she chuckled. "The son being trained by the father's great enemy. To fight whom in the end, I wonder?"
"God is prone to whimsy," pronounced Ajatasutra.
"Nonsense," countered Anastasius. "The logic seems impeccable to me. Especially when we consider what Aristotle had to say about-"
Chapter 37
The Punjab
Autumn, 533 A.D.
Belisarius went across on the first ship, leaving Maurice to stabilize the Roman defensive lines at Uch. He had no intention of trying to hold Uch, beyond the two or three days necessary to transfer the entire army across the Chenab. But keeping an army steady while it is making a fighting withdrawal requires a very firm hand in control, a characterization which fit Maurice perfectly.
Belisarius wanted to get a sense of the land he would be holding as soon as possible, which was why he decided to take the risk of being part of the initial landing. His subordinates had protested that decision, rather vehemently, but Belisarius fit the description of "very firm" quite well himself.
Besides, he thought the risk was minimal. The small triangle of land formed by the confluence of the Chenab and the Indus was not well situated to defend against an invasion of the Punjab. For that purpose, it made far more sense to fortify the Indus south of the fork-which was exactly what the Malwa had done. So Belisarius expected to encounter no enemy troops beyond cavalry patrols. And against those, the cataphracts and Arab scouts crammed into the ship should suffice.
"Crammed" was the operative term, however, and Belisarius was thankful that the river crossing took not much more than an hour. By the time his own ship began offloading its soldiers, the second ship the Romans had captured when they took Uch was halfway across the river bearing its own load of troops.
Belisarius landed on the bank of the Chenab just north of Panjnad Head, which marked the confluence of the Chenab and the Sutlej. That position was much too far north for him to hold for long. The Indus was fifteen miles away, and the confluence of the Indus and the Chenab was twenty-five miles to the southwest, forming a triangle well over sixty miles in circumference-more likely eighty or ninety miles, considering all the loops and bends in the two rivers. With the twenty thousand men he still had left, he could not possibly hope to defend such a large territory for more than a few days.
But unless the Romans encountered a sizeable Malwa force in the triangle-which he didn't expect to happen-Belisarius could hold that position for those few days. Just enough time to begin throwing up his fortifications further south, in a much smaller triangle, while his men foraged as much food and fodder as possible. Their supplies were now running very low. They had captured a fair amount of gunpowder in Uch, but not much in the way of provisions.
Even more important, perhaps, than rounding up food would be rounding up the civilian population. The Punjab was the most fertile region of the Indus, and the population density was hig
h. Here, the Malwa had not conducted the savage massacres of civilians which they had in the Sind-although word of those massacres had undoubtedly begun spreading. Which, from Belisarius' point of view, was all to the good. The peasants in the triangle would not have fled yet, but they would be on edge. And more likely to fear their Malwa overlords than the Roman invaders.
Once again, Belisarius intended to use mercy-defining that term very loosely-as a weapon against his enemy. His cavalry would cut across to the Indus and then, much like barbarian horsemen in a great hunt on the steppes, drive the game before them to the south, penning them into a narrower and narrower triangle. Except the "game" would be peasants, not animals. And the purpose of it would not be to eat the game, but to use them as a labor force. The kind of fortifications Belisarius intended to construct would require a lot of labor-far more than he had at his disposal from his own soldiers, even including the thousands of Malwa prisoners that they had captured.
How many, Aide, do you think?
Aide gave that shivering image which was his equivalent of a shrug. Impossible to say. There are no records of such things, at this point in history. In later times, the Punjab would hold a population numbering in the millions, with a density of five hundred people to a square mile. It won't be that high today, of course, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was half that. So you may well wind up with tens of thousands of people for a work force. Many of them will be oldsters and children, of course.
Belisarius paused to exchange a few last words with Abbu. The Arab scouts were offloading first. As always, Abbu and his men would provide Belisarius with reconnaissance. That done, he returned to his mental conversation with Aide.
So many? Better than I had hoped. With twenty thousand, I am confident I can erect the fortifications I need before the Malwa can organize a serious siege.